Defined Terms

Shifting Through The Four Gears to Early Rehabilitation and Release  or  Four Gears of Early Rehabilitation and Release  or  Four Gears

'Parent Punishing a Child in the Home' Philosophy refers to an act by a parent, or other legal guardian, causing deliberate physical pain or discomfort to a child in response to some undesired/unacceptable behavior by their child. This typically has taken the form of spanking or slapping the child on the hand or buttocks, with an open hand, or striking with an implement such as a belt, slipper, cane, hairbrush or paddle.

A parent punishes their child for a naughty transgression from acceptable child behaviour with a few smacks of the wrong end of a feather duster has existed from time immemorial.  Even before feather dusters.  To the offending child, the punishment is swiftly administered, frightening and temporarily painful.  Once punishment had been dispensed, rehabilitation back to a normal parent/child relationship immediately follows.

The model has universally prevailed for hundreds, thousands, if not tens of thousands of years amongst communities under the belief of ‘spare the rod, and spoil the child’.

Parent Punishing a Child in the Home' Philosophy has previously been adopted as Judicial Corporal Punishment for juveniles as chronicled in four Newspaper Articles all published in May 1956 - 62 years ago:

Four Gears of Early Rehabilitation and Release are -

1st.      a Swift, Frightening and a Painful Dose of Corporal Punishment administered after Sentencing and any legal appeals are heard and determined - Floggings would be in line with those Sentenced in the final 30 years of Judicial Corporal Punishment for Adults in Australia until the mid-1940s - still Sentenced in three adjacent Commonwealth of Nations Countries in South East Asia - Malaysia, Singapore and Brunei - Singapore: Judicial and prison caning that each have significantly lower crime rates than Australia;

2^nd.     Rehabilitation that adopts the Restorative Justice Model Successfully Adopted in Scandinavia since the late 20th century and the Texas Justice Reinvestment in particular Improving Responses to People with Mental Illnesses with Specialist Drug & Alcohol Treatment;

3^rd.      Education and Vocational Training to instill self-belief and optimism due to the opportunity for a chance at a paid job; and

4^th.      expedited custodial release back to the community ideally as taxpayers into an employed job for a minimum of three months offered by Supportive ASX 200 Companies, by utilising an Electronic Monitoring Device.

Based on the successes described in 2^nd. above in Scandinavia and Texas, Four Gears of Early Rehabilitation and Release would -

(i)        reduce the $4.415 billion total net operating expenditure on prisons and community corrections 2017-'18 by $300 million pa within 5 years and up to a $1 billion within 10 years on a per capita basis;

(ii)       (after 5 years of implementation) materially reduce the current unsustainable Recidivism/re-offending rates of -
 *       greater than 50% of inmates returning to jail within three years of release;
 *       to less than 40% within three years of release,
 thereby approaching what it has in Denmark, Norway, Sweden and Finland;

(iii)      be a more effective Deterrent to others committing Non-Murderous Crimes; and

(iv)      increase income tax coffers at the ATO by around ¹/6 of ½% within 5 years and ¼ of 1% within 10 years.

Solution To Reduce Prison Populations recommends that for Non-Murderous Crimes and for Suitable Male Criminals jail incarceration should not be a Punishment institution, but be Tailored To Rehabilitation after Corporal Punishment Is Administered.